Enter the dragon

Is it fair to say that Red Dragon is very different to the films you've done before?

Yeah and I thought it was time to jump into that Hollywood mainstream and see what the temperature was. And it was warmer than I expected [laughs].

But you jumped in with good company ...

I did and that's the trick. I mean, I really didn't know what to expect when you first turn up and there are trailers as far as the eye can see, and hundreds and hundreds of PAs. But actually when you get down to it, most of my scenes were with Ralph Fiennes who is the most real, proper actor's actor you could hope to work with. And I enjoyed it very much indeed.

Did you actually get to do any scenes with Anthony Hopkins?");document.write("

advertisement

");
}
}
// -->

No. We had dinner and he was on set a bit and he seemed like a very nice man. A very singular, particular intelligence and fiercely concentrated. I liked him. He's certainly done some amazing work.

Did you see him in character as Lecter?

I went into his trailer to say hello and he was in all the Lecter gear and he turned round and said "hello" in that voice [laughs] and I was like "oohh" and my stomach turned a little. Scary!

How do you think that people will view Red Dragon?

I think it's very character driven. And what attracted me to it was the sense that we would investigate the relationships between the characters. One crucial part of the story is the fact that the detective, Will Graham [played by Ed Norton], has to try and imagine his way into the killer's head to be able to detect and try and imagine what the killer feels, which is a very scary place to put yourself. But also in terms of what the audience feels, they have to invest in the relationship also with Reba, my character and Dolarhyde [Fiennes]. Dolarhyde is conflicted, he is not just an out and out serial killer, he wants to stop, he wants to go down a different path and Reba represents that.

So there is a degree of sympathy for him?

Yes. My character is blind and she senses that he is kind of an outsider and they share that sense of being a bit different. And she is also a bit of a sexual predator, she wants to find someone. Unfortunately, she finds the wrong kind of man.

Did you do any research for the role?

Yes, I did a little course at the RNIB [Royal National Institute of the Blind] and I spent a bit of a time with a girl who is almost completely visually impaired and she was fascinating. She was such a great girl. She's incredibly active, she's a researcher, she's just had a baby, she goes to judo twice a week, you would not know when you meet her that she can hardly see. She has the most incredibly expressive face, really beautiful, wonderful eyes and she is very animated. And that was really helpful and very interesting. She is really proud of the fact that she can function like anybody else. Obviously there are hurdles but there is nothing she can't do, she really lives life and that was very important to me, not just to portray this character as a victim.

Is it rather an uneasy feeling when you meet someone like that for research purposes?

Absolutely. I do think you feel a little bit like you are preying on people's lives. But actually it was a real mutual thing, because she had read the book and she is a Thomas Harris fan she loves the book, her husband reads to her. So she was really into it and really excited about the whole project. And she talked about the character, she actually had some ideas of her own.

There's an extraordinary scene when your character strokes a real, fully grown tiger. What was that like tofilm?

Not just to film, but the experience of being in a room with a tiger like that was amazing. We were all in this tiny little room and the door opened and this tiger walked in, literally, just sort of padded into the room and looked around. The pattern on her face, I've never seen such presence and it made everyone take a deep breath. She was so beautiful and she was lying on the table fully awake the whole time and growling because it is not legal to sedate an animal for the purposes of filming any more. She had two trainers with her and they had a rope around her neck so she couldn't get up and run off or attack anybody. And she was being fed meat all the time. I had to walk up behind her and stroke her, as you see in the film, and occasionally she would sit up and look around and I just had to walk away again very gently. If you made any sudden movements she would have noticed you and got interested in you but unless she was hungry she just treated us like part of the furniture. And then when I put my hand on her, it was like when you put your hand on a cat and you can feel the vibration when they are purring, but times a thousand.

Did you feel that this was a big challenge to play a blindwoman?

It was a challenge, yeah. But as an actor, the kind of actor that I am, that's my bread and butter to have something like that, a skill you have to master. What was very interesting for me was to try and express myself without using my eyes and to have on-screen chemistry with somebody without ever making visual contact. And that was interesting.

Are you a fan of the thriller genre?

I think Silence Of The Lambs was a great film and when somebody does that kind of suspense thing, with that much restraint, it's impressive. It's not a book that I would necessarily reach for. And I wrestled a little bit with certain aspects of it. But I think this film is much more about what you don't see rather than what you do see. I wouldn't be interested in a slasher kind of movie, it's more in the tradition of the great suspenseful thrillers.You must have been offered big Hollywood movies before and it does seem you've chosen a different path ...Actually, there's been a hurdle that's been quite difficult for me to get over in terms of Hollywood. I've had a lot of critical acclaim and in those terms I've got some clout in Hollywood. But I don't in box-office terms, which is their major criteria, and I've actually had directors wanting me to do things but the studio have gone "who?" so ... [shrugs]. But I'd much rather it was that way round.

But did it feel different working on a big-budget film like this?

Yeah, physically it was huge. There were caravans as far as the eye could see and it was a huge event. And there were tourists going round on trams on the lot and you just felt you were part of the whole machine which is a bit weird.